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Background to the original London production
1974-1981: Pre-Starlight projects According to Andrew Lloyd Webber, Starlight Express has its roots in three abandoned projects: an animated TV series based on Thomas the Tank Engine, a novelty pop single, and an animated film based on Cinderella. Thomas the Tank Engine In 1974, Lloyd Webber approached author Reverend W. Awdry about adapting Awdry’s Thomas the Tank Engine stories as an animated TV series.2 He later recalled that ‘writing music for something as simple and heartwarming as Thomas would be a joyous antidote to the heavy waters of Evita’, the musical he was working on at the time.Unmasked, Andrew Lloyd Webber Following the meeting, Lloyd Webber starting composing, with actor and children’s TV writer Peter Reeves contributing lyrics. They pitched their material to Granada TV, who commissioned a pilot episode. The episode was completed in early 1976, but Grenada ultimately decided not to produce a full series as they feared that Awdry’s stories were not then popular enough outside the UK to justify investing the time and money needed to make the series. Another contributing factor was that Awdry did not give Webber much creative flexability. The Thomas stories eventually did get adapted to television by Britt Allcroft in 1984 (albeit with actual model trains and wooden figures instead of traditional animation, before switching to full CGI in 2009), and has gone on to become one of the longest-running children's television series, still premiering new episodes and annual feature-length specials to this day. Engine of Love After withdrawing from the project, Lloyd Webber heard a recording of an American soul singer, Earl Jordan, who could sing three notes at once in the style of a steam whistle. Lloyd Webber and Peter Reeves wrote a novelty pop song for Jordan called 'Engine of Love', which was released in 1977. The song failed to chart, but 'Engine of Love' would go on to feature in some productions of Starlight Express. Cinderella Around the same time as writing 'Engine of Love', an American TV station invited Lloyd Webber to compose songs for an animated film of Cinderella. In this version of the story, the Prince would hold a competition to decide which engine would pull the royal train across the United States of America. Cinderella would be a steam engine and the ugly sisters would be a diesel engine and an electric engine. The project went into development hell, but Lloyd Webber remained interested in the idea of telling a story with trains. 1982: Richard Stilgoe comes onboard Starlight Express proper began in 1982. In early 1981, Lloyd Webber asked lyricist Richard Stilgoe to help ‘doctor’ the opening number of CATS, which was in rehearsal and due to open in the West End that May. Stilgoe recalls that ‘once CATS was put out for the night, Andrew showed me the Cinderella story, and talked to me of trains.’Richard Stilgoe's introduction in the London 1984 programme Starlight Express remained dormant until 1982, when Lloyd Webber took his then 4-year-old son, Nicholas, to the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut. Lloyd Webber recalls that ‘a steam railway runs there, and I'll never forget Nicholas’s face when it passed. Because of his reaction, I decided to dig out the sketches of the score that I had written many years ago.’NY Times review, March 1987 1982: Sydmonton Festival (Trevor Nunn comes onboard) On 10 July 1982, Lloyd Webber and Stilgoe presented early material for Starlight Express at Lloyd Webber’s Sydmonton Festival. A cast of Elaine Paige, Paul Nicholas and Bonnie Langford performed numbers including the title song, Only He and a country and western spoof “Stand by Your Engine”. At this stage, Lloyd Webber intended Starlight Express to be a concert for schools, in the style of Lloyd Webber’s breakthrough musical, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat. The plan was to form a choir from children at schools across the City of London, who would perform a concert to open the new Barbican Centre. However, the direction of Starlight Express took a turn when he spoke to the director, Trevor Nunn, who was in the audience that day. Nunn felt that the current version was too ‘twee’6. He argued that, if Starlight Express was to be a show for children, then it must ‘offer something children have never experienced or seen anything like before.' To Nunn, this meant more competition, a current pop score and, ‘above all that it could be a staged 'event', with more ‘spectacle and theatre magic’, rather than a traditional musical theatre performance.Andrew Lloyd Webber's programme note for the London 1984 production Nunn joined the creative team and helped Lloyd Webber and Stilgoe and Nunn develop the story to include the idea of trains and coaches racing. 1982: Arlene Phillips comes onboard With Trevor Nunn onboard, Andrew Lloyd Webber telephoned Arlene Phillips to ask if she would be interested in choreographing Starlight Express.Arlene Philips' programme note for the 1st US Tour, 1989 Phillips recalls that she had only worn roller stakes twice before: once as a child, then in 1979 in Hollywood, when she was choreographed a sequence on skates for a film. She was seven months pregnant at the time and had ‘been hastily taught to skate’ herself. 1983: Workshop In 1983 the first act of the ‘now-embryonic’ Starlight Express was workshopped over 6 weeks by director Trevor Nunn and choreographer Arlene Phillips. The venue was the Notre Dame Hall, near Leicester Square (since rebuilt and reopened as the Leicester Square Theatre). The cast was made up of traditional musical theatre performers and street dancers with little or no theatre experience. The role of Pearl was played by the comedienne Tracey Ullman and Electra by the pop star Zaine Griffhttp://starlightexpress-club.mountlaurelmartialarts.com/drue-williams/. The first 2 weeks of the workshop were a training camp. The musical theatre actors were taught to skate and the skaters were given ‘the shortest dance training in history’. The workshop converted Lloyd Webber to Trevor’s vision of creating a show that ‘could reach audiences for whom theatre was a no-go zone; not just the Joseph children’s audience but street kids who might relate to Starlight and then graze on more grown-up fodder.’ Based on workshop’s success, Starlight Express went into full-scale production with an opening date of March 1984. Call Me Rusty - Ray Shell, Workshop 1983 Wide Smile - Michael Staniforth Workshop 1983 Category:Productions